Slumberland

I stumbled onthis 1917 ad while browsing Google Books last night. We have old pushbutton light switches in our house, which was built in 1911, but none of them glow in the dark. I guess our “modern house is not complete.”

Hewn and Hammered is a brand-new weblog about Craftsman, Mission, and Prairie design and architecture. The blog isn’t just about house restoration, but will also discuss the work of current and historical A&C artists and craftspeople, and include articles about the history and philosophy of the Arts and Crafts movement.

The site is edited by the editor of the excellent Typographica web site, so it ought to be good.

Ken Woolcott bought a historic house on Queen Anne Hill — a 1914 house by one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s prot?g?s that was “one of the 10 or 15 most significant houses in the city.” Did he restore it? No. He had it demolished without even allowing a serious attempt at salvage.

The secretiveness of the project indicates that he knew there would be objections, and so the demolition was done without even giving preservationists and historians a chance to document the house and salvage reusable items. The selfishness of such an act (and the weak justifications given by Mr. Woolcott) sadden me greatly.

I understand that he owns the property now, but when one buys a historic property a certain responsibility comes with it. He could have allowed the home to be moved, studied, or salvaged before building his new dream home (which I imagine will be a monstrosity). He didn’t. He may have financial wealth, but he’s awfully poor in the civic duty area.

Today I visited the Stimson-Green Mansion on First Hill, since I am researching it for a paper. Here are some photos I took. The house was built in 1901. It is strongly influenced by English Arts and Crafts, but is an Eclectic style — several rooms are Tudor, one is Empire style, one is a sort of Moorish style. All of it is incredibly well-crafted, and well-preserved. It’s amazing that the gilded burlap wall covering in the entry hall, for example, was not removed over the years. The painted design on it has been retouched, but it is otherwise original.

Mostly these are pictures of details within the house. The big pictures of the rooms and hallways, and the exterior, are easily found online and in books, but the details are harder to find, so I photographed those. Unfortunately I ran out of photo battery power so I didn’t get as many photos as I had hoped to get.

You can see other pictures and info about the house (including exterior shots and lots of stuff I didn’t get to photograph) at:

http://www.cityofseattle.net/commnty/histsea/projects/pr14.htm
http://www.historylink.org/_output.CFM?file_ID=2713
http://www.cr.nps.gov/nr/travel/seattle/s15.htm
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/pacificnw/2001/1104/living.html

Not that anything’s wrong with Portland. I like it a lot. But my favorite home restoration store in Portland is opening a Seattle branch — just down the hill from my house! 5 minutes away (and near the new Krispy Kreme, etc.)

Still, Portland has Powell’s, so I’ll still be driving south occasionally.

This strikes me as a rather unfortunate remodeling of a neat old house. The one on the right may be bigger, but the one on the left has far more character and beauty. What were they thinking?!

Went to the Bungalow Fair at Town Hall yesterday and saw some amazing stuff, none of which we can afford. Gorgeous antique furniture, silkscreen, watercolor and letterpress prints, William Morris wallpapers, pottery, etc. There was a book I really wanted: a 100 year-old art book with tons of amazing engravings — but it was $400.

Since we couldn’t improve the house with any of that, I came home and sanded the spackled walls in the foyer until my arms gave out. It’s a little more than half done (yes, I am a wimp), and the next steps are: finish sanding, get Jason to spackle some of the ceiling bits I can’t reach, clean the walls, tape, primer, and paint. (Then there is some floor work but I don’t want to think about that right now.)

This is the slowest renovation ever.

Well, the house thing is still going on. Thanks to those who sent letters of support or showed up at the library board meeting yesterday to help. There’s still a lot of work for us to do in the next six days before the final decision is made, so site updates might be sporadic. I’m sure you understand.

Sorry it’s been slow lately. See the 19 feb entry for the reason why. Today we go to a library board meeting and try to present our case one more time.